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A day with my daughter

Hurrah… I made my wife dream come true by managing my lovely sunshine (daughter) for a whole day. Well, it is overwhelming to think how I managed. I think these are some tips a bad father (like me) can follow to satiate the need of the situation.

To start off with, I didn’t make my daughter realize that her mom is out. We planned the escape when the tiger (daughter) is asleep. By the time she woke up, it is not in my hands to bring her mother back, because she is in Bangalore’s crazy traffic. It is easy to manage my kid instead of giving instructions to my wife what bus to catch, and escape the ire of being serious offender (by not managing my daughter).

By the way, let me recollect how I managed:

Entertainment: My old laptop is hers now, she stamps feet and tap to the tunes as if she is an amateur dancer and croons to the tunes by nodding her head as if she knows how to pronounce every word. Well, seeing all these is an entertainment to the daddy, but my souls come out and knock my dream off by saying “hey dude, come down…can't be so proud, you didn't teach her how to dance neither how to sing. She got it from YouTube, mind it”. But I must be proud that my smart daughter can handle my smart phone so smartly. At her age, I even don’t how to hold my dad’s little finger.

Sympathetic calls: Now and then I am bombarded with sympathetic calls from my parents about my pathetic situation. They start giving tips and lectures at the neck of the moment. Instead, why didn’t they teach this important lesson beforehand? Who knows they may be taking revenge for all the cranky things I did when young.

Obsession: My daughter is obsessed with the things/persons which are not around, she constantly reminds them. I got things like balloons and toys to transiently replace her thought about her mom. But once she played with them for a 10 min (10 min is too long, it could be half minute sometimes) she reminds her mom again, and then she tries to open the door to find her, don’t know where to go starts crying. I am running out of weapons, but luckily there is another one which I haven’t used it before. This weapon can cool down anything effervescent obsession. And it is none other than “Strawberry ice cream”. Yummy! Yes, she likes it most, even in such painful thought of not having her mother around the ice-cream brings a smile in her eyes replacing the river of tears.

Oh my gosh!! It worked really well, I have used this one quite a few times by the end of the day, and she never got bored. From now on, I have decided to stock this important artillery at my disposal when required.

Feeding: I am very poor in this section. I can feed banana very well because I just need to peel the skin off, but not very good in persuading her to eat a morsel. I tried her mom style by playing some songs and make her mock cat, dog, and lion. But, nothing really worked, when I take food near to her mouth with great caution not to spill, she just turns away. At the end, most of the fatty food with ghee has to go to my gut. Instead of starving her, I fed her with her favorites - pomegranate seeds, almonds and other nuts.

Sleeping: It is easy to awake Ravan’s brother (kumbakharna) from sleep rather to make my kid sleep. She asks me to tell king stories, I started with Pandavas, and then about Ramayana and then comes monkeys. That’s it her antennas receive signals and activated, instead of sleeping she explained me about all the animals she knows. Cursing myself, I have to shut my mouth for some time. Nothing works, only she has to exhaust herself to relax her eye lids and fall asleep. I had to be patient for next few minutes, if any damn thing like door or window makes noise, she wakes up. I had to froze my body parts for some time and lay there till she does not move her eyelids. And then, it’s party time, but I had to be like a burglar in my home by walking on toes and watching TV on mute.

Overall, I think I have done a good job, by not letting her cry much. But I score low marks in feeding and cleanliness. The next day I received the report card from her mother with negative marks, reiterating how bad I am. Without any reaction, I packed my bag and went to the office for another labor.

I am PhD graduate in science, interested in writing, these are inspired by real life incidents with certain amount of fiction. I have been inspired by many authors but I like the writings which are practical. This blog is intended to express my feelings and these expression are purely one sided; does not mean to hurt others.